2 in the Morning
by flowerchild3286
Summary: Payson is hiding something and it has Sasha worried. Based on the New Kids on the Block song 2 in the Morning.
1. 2 in the Morning

A/N: Well, it's been forever since I've been on here, so hello again! I wrote this story a while back... it was a commission from my friend Rachel, who is a huge New Kids on the Block fan... and just now realized that I never posted it. This was my first ever songfic.

* * *

_I know you must have had a long day_

_Cause at six o'clock I heard you say_

_There was something that was on your mind_

_But you ain't told me and it's almost nine_

Sasha looked at his watch for approximately the twenty third time in the past hour. It was nearly six o'clock and Payson still wasn't home, which wouldn't have worried him if she hadn't been acting so weird all day. She'd stayed home sick from practice that morning, but then she texted him in the middle of the day saying she was going out but would be back in time for dinner. Skipping practice without a good reason went against everything he thought he knew about his wife. He'd spent half the day convinced that something was horribly wrong.

When she finally walked through the door, it took every inch of Sasha's self control not to berate her with questions. Instead he tried to sound casual as he said, "Hey, I'm glad you're home. I've been worried about you; are you feeling better?"

"Yeah, a little. I'm still feeling a little off, though."

Since she was staying so reticent, he tried a different tactic. There was one thing she would always talk about: "I hope you're feeling well enough to go to the gym tomorrow. The Olympic Trials are just around the corner."

Payson shrugged. "Yeah, I don't know. I'll have to see how I feel in the morning."

Those two short sentences sent Sasha into a spiral of panic. Never—_never_—had Payson blown off practice like that, much less when they were fifty two days away from the Olympic Trials. He stopped trying to be subtle and finally asked, "What's wrong, Payson? Where have you been all afternoon?"

She tried to give him a smile but wasn't quite successful. "Nothing's wrong, Sasha, other than just feeling a little sick. I've just got a lot on my mind right now, and I went over to my parents' house to talk to my mom. That's it; I'm fine. I promise."

_Now it's nine o'clock and I thought we could talk_

_But you ain't givin' it, girl_

_Will this ever end? Girl, it's almost ten_

_Gotta know if you're mad at me before Grey's Anatomy_

_Cause we could drag this out all night_

The pressure against his chest was far heavier than they weight of Payson's head resting against him had ever been. She'd barely spoken a word to him over dinner, and now she was curled up on the opposite side of the couch from him. The few feet between them might as well have been a mile. Since the night in the Olympic Village when she accidently fell asleep against him watching the Track and Field finals, her place on the couch had always been at his side, with her head on his chest and her arms wrapped around him. It was almost a ritual between them, to honor the night that they'd realized their feelings for each other. Now her choice to sit away from him felt intentional. He didn't understand what was happening between them.

When Payson stood up to go to bed without even speaking to him, he panicked. He grabbed her hand to stop her from going, desperately blurting out, "You're not going to stay up and watch Grey's Anatomy? You never miss it."

"No, I'm too tired. I just want to go to sleep." She pulled her hand out of his, leaving him staring after her as she walked away. He wanted to follow after her, but he wasn't sure he could handle watching her turn away from him in bed, so he stayed on the couch as long as he could manage.

_Lights are out, don't wanna wake you so I'm creepin' in_

_I know you're hurt 'cause baby you're not sleepin' in_

_My favorite pair of boxers that you make look so hot, girl_

_Girl, you're playin' sleep but I know that you're not, girl_

He drowsed on the couch for a while, afraid of the silent welcome he was going to get in his bedroom, before guilt finally drove him to bed. He kept thinking of Payson lying there shivering; whenever she was forced to sleep alone at competitions she always complained that she was cold because she'd gotten used to having his body heat next to her.

The lights were out so he undressed in the dark. He didn't want to wake his wife, because even though he felt certain that something else was going on, he also thought she might actually be sick. She'd looked terrible all day.

He crawled into their bed and slid over to wrap his arm around Payson. The way she relaxed against him eased his anxiety by the tiniest amount—hopefully that meant that she wasn't angry with him. Of course, that involuntary reaction didn't counter the realization that she was feigning sleep. He'd spent more than enough nights with her to know her breathing patterns, so he was well aware that she was awake. Awake but pretending not to be.

It took him about the same amount of time to realize that she wasn't wearing her typical attire. Payson's favorite pajamas were a tank top and a pair of his old boxers; she'd stolen them from him the after the first time they slept together and never given them back. Now, years later, they were worn out and the elastic was showing at the waistband, but she still managed to make them look sexy. Tonight she was wearing nothing but an oversized t-shirt, which should have turned him on, but at this point felt more confusing and upsetting than anything. He just wished she would _talk_ to him and tell him what was going on. If she was angry with him he wanted to know about it.

_And now it's 12 o'clock and I thought I should talk_

_But girl, you're not listening_

_Here we go again, you know I like it when_

_You got your back to me,_

_But not when you're mad at a me_

_Please look at me and say goodnight_

"Pay, please talk to me."

He'd held out as long as he could, but the silence between them was killing him. She was still awake and still not talking, and he just couldn't handle it. They'd fought before—he'd actually fought more with her than any woman he'd ever been with—but those arguments were usually _loud_, not quiet. Payson had a fiery temper, and when she was mad she made it known. He'd never seen her withdraw like this, and it was terrifying him.

She didn't respond in any way other than to take several deep breaths as if this would convince him she was asleep. At almost any other time he would have respected this clear indication that she didn't want to talk, but the later it got the more freaked out he was, so he did something stupid. He rested his hand on her shoulder and said, "I know you're awake. I just want to know what's wrong—you've never shut down like this before. Please just talk to me."

Payson finally stopped feigning sleep and turned in his arms. He could barely see her in the dark, but it looked like she'd been crying. "I'm sorry, Sasha. I know I've been weird all day and I'm sure you're probably having a panic attack right now trying to figure out what's going on, but I'm not ready to talk about it yet. I'm still processing. I need you to give me time."

Her simple words made him feel like an ass for pushing her. Clearly she wanted some privacy, and he would have to force himself to give it to her, no matter how worried he was. "Just answer one question and then I promise I'll leave you alone... are you okay?"

She paused for a long moment before answering, "I'm not really sure."

_It's 2 in the morning_

_Girl, what do you wanna do?_

_Do you wanna fight?_

_Wanna say goodnight?_

_If you tell me you want it,_

_This could be over_

Worry cut into his sleep so that he woke repeatedly, always with Payson curled against him but never with her asleep. She didn't speak so neither did he; he was determined to give her whatever she needed, even if that was silence from him. He managed this fairly well until the time he woke up alone.

Absolute panic set in.

He found her in the kitchen. Here he was freaking out, and she was having a midnight snack—or a 2 am snack, to be more precise.

"Did you get a little hungry?" He only kind of kept the sarcasm out of his voice; Payson knew what she'd married.

She snorted, which was the first sign of the normal Payson he'd seen all day. "Not hungry, nauseous. I'm just trying to settle my stomach."

He took in the box of saltine crackers in front of her as he sat down at their table. "Ah, so you are sick. I've not been able to tell for sure if you were sick or upset."

"Honestly, both," she answered. He hardly dared to breathe in case she stopped opening up to him. She, on the other hand, took a deep breath before she started talking. "Listen, I'm sorry for the way I've been acting all day. I know I've been freaking you out. _I've_ been freaking out. And kind of—I don't know, mourning, I guess. Because I've worked really hard but now I'm not going to make it to Rio."

He moved from anxious to confused. "What do you mean? You're the reigning National and World Champion and you've been perfect in practice. Why wouldn't you make the Olympic Team?"

She bit her lip and looked away from him, like she was afraid to answer. He reached out to take her hand, and this seemed to give her the courage she needed. "Sasha... I'm pregnant."

"You're pregnant?" He wasn't sure how long he stared at her as he tried to process her news, but eventually he managed to wrap his head around it and exclaim, "Oh my God, you're pregnant!" He pulled her out of her chair and into his arms so that he could kiss her soundly.

She returned the kiss wholeheartedly, which was a profound relief after her distance throughout the day. It was the happiest she's looked all day. "So you're okay with this? You're not upset? I know this wasn't planned, and the timing is so bad, and..."

She trailed off as he pressed a kiss to her forehead. "Upset? Payson, we're having a baby, how could I possibly be upset? This is the most amazing gift you've ever given me. I don't care about the timing—" It finally hit him like slap in the face; she's said that she was in mourning. "Oh God, I'm such an ass. _You're_ upset. You've lost out on going to the Olympics."

"I'm kind of really happy and really sad and really scared at the same time... Does that make sense? I love you and I'm so happy that we're going to have a baby, but I just didn't expect that to happen three months before the Olympics. I was _so_ close."

"I'm sorry, Pay. I hate that you're losing your dream, even for something as amazing as this." He felt suddenly guilty. They'd always been careful, but was there something more he could have done?

Payson wiped away the tears that had sprung suddenly to her eyes. "Okay, I've spent the whole day coming to terms with this, and yeah, I was really sad about not going to Rio, but now I just want to be happy. No more talk about the Olympics."

"How about one last bit of Olympic talk... since you can't go to Rio, why don't you just go to Tokyo?"

She laughed. "You're crazy. I'll be twenty seven."

"A lot of people said it was crazy for you to go at twenty three," he pointed out. "So this is what I'm promising you: I'll support you in whatever you want to do. If you want to retire and move on, I'll be there by your side, and if you want to get back in the gym after the baby is born, I'll be right there coaching you. You can still be a two time Olympic Champion if you want to be."

She pressed a kiss to his lips before saying, "You are the best husband in the world. I've been acting like an ass all day but all you're doing is supporting me."

"You weren't acting like an ass, and even if you were, I think an unexpected pregnancy and complete change of your future plans is a pretty good excuse." It was true that she had him panicking all day, but now he felt sure that she'd been panicking even more. "It's been a long day, and it's past two in the morning. Let's go to bed."

The first time he'd gone to bed that night he'd been alone and frightened that he was somehow losing his wife. The second time, he walked hand in hand with Payson, looking to the future with a child that he already loved. He was still scared, but on this side of 2 a.m. it was a good kind of scared.


	2. No Problem

A/N: As it frequently goes, once I write a story a follow up just sort of happened. I mentioned the night their relationship started in 2 in the Morning, and my brain just HAD to write it.

* * *

"Come on, guys, you can't go to bed now. Usain Bolt is running soon and it's a medal race!"

Sasha couldn't help but chuckle. Leave it to Payson Keeler to want to stay up late to watch another athlete compete just a few hours after she won her own gold medal—her fifth and last, along with a silver on the beam. She should be exhausted; Kelly and Lauren both were, and they'd only competed in one event each that day.

Nobody listened to Payson's protest. Lauren had been upstairs for the past half hour, Emily followed not long after, and now Kaylie and Kelly were both getting up from the couch yawning. "You're nuts, Pay," Kelly said. "We can watch his race online tomorrow. _Late_ tomorrow, because I fully intend to sleep until noon."

"Yeah, this is day one of our retirement," Kaylie added. "Which means we're supposed to be lazy for at least a week. Maybe more. I might not get out of bed at all for a few days."

Payson pouted. "You guys are so lame. Sasha, Austin, are you staying?"

"Sorry, but I tap out when Kelly does," said Austin. He got up to follow his girlfriend up the stairs, but she pushed him away by the time he reached the third step and let him know in no uncertain terms that she was way too tired to do anything but sleep, so he could go to his own bed. He made a dejected path out of the girls' apartment, but if Sasha was any judge of the way the past few weeks had gone, it was all an act. He'd heard Payson complain about them monopolizing the room she shared with Kelly.

From the top of the stairs Kelly called back, "If you can't find some of your medals tomorrow, Payson, just know... it definitely wasn't me."

Sasha flashed a grin at Payson. "Do you think she'll actually steal them?"

"Yeah, she's kind of a klepto. She stole one of my gold medals from Worlds the first week we lived together. She always gives them back though. So... are you going to bail on me too?"

She looked so sad that her friends had abandoned her that he couldn't possibly leave, so instead he answered, "Are you kidding? And miss Usain Bolt defend his title for the 200 meter?"

The settled back into the couch to watch the Olympic coverage, which was not nearly as exciting after having been in the Olympic Arena themselves for so many nights, which is why they spent most of the half hour leading up to Bolt's race talking about their own experiences. Payson had done spectacularly well, and so had her friends. Their team gold had been followed up with a 1-2 finish for Payson and Kelly in the All Around, Emily had finished third in the bars final, Kelly had a silver on the floor, and Lauren had a vault bronze and beam gold. "I still can't wrap my head around the fact that the three most successful women in the competition all live together. I have never fully understood how the three of you ended up sharing a house anyway."

Payson snorted. "Honestly, I'm not certain either. It all happened so fast... first I was going to buy a house by myself, then Kelly needed to get away from her mom so she asked if she could live with me, and then Lauren just kind of inserted herself into the equation. We're like the weirdest group of people to live together that you could imagine, but I kinda love it."

"It's been good for you." This he could say without the slightest hesitation. Living with Kelly and Lauren had helped her loosen up. All of the things that had always been wonderful about her—her sense of humor, her kindness, her work ethic—were still there, but now she was more willing to goof off and have fun. She'd even gone to a few parties. "Do you think you'll stay together now that you're all retiring?"

Payson chewed on her bottom lip. "Yeah, I've been thinking about that... I might not."

"Are you going to move somewhere else?" He'd known for a while that she might leave Boulder once the Olympics were over, but he'd tried not to think about it.

"No, not that I might not keep living with the girls. I've been thinking that I might not retire."

There had been plenty of things that shocked him in the two years since he started coaching at the Rock, but this might have been the most shocking of them all. It had never occurred to him that any of the girls might want to continue competing after the Olympics. It had been done before, obviously, but the trend in America was mass retirement at the end of each quad.

Once he managed to wrap his head around the concept, he was thrilled. "I think that's fabulous, Pay. You've got so much left to give to this sport."

"And you'd be okay sticking around to coach me?" she asked, still chewing on her lip. Apparently this was something she was worried over. "I know you don't really have any ties to Boulder and you're only contracted through the Olympics, so I thought you might want to leave."

This was the easiest decision of his life. "As long as you want to compete, I'll be there to coach you. We can go all the way to Rio if you want."

Payson beamed. She looked as happy now as she'd been standing on the gold medal podium; he had no idea how much it meant to her to have him as a coach. He was flattered beyond reason.

They stopped talking when the race was about to start, and then cheered like crazy for the twenty seconds that it took for Usain Bolt to win. After half an hour of lead up to the race, it was almost anticlimactic how fast it was over. Of course, there was also the medal ceremony, which Payson insisted that they watch.

Neither of them actually made it to the medal ceremony before they fell asleep.

It was a little after midnight when he woke up. Payson had slumped over against him in her sleep so that her head was resting against his chest. He looked down at her and was struck by how beautiful she was. He had always known that about her, but he'd never felt it in this visceral, gut wrenching way before. She was so gorgeous that it took his breath away.

He brushed his fingers across her cheek, reveling in the softness of her skin. He had no idea what had come over him. He was mesmerized by her—he traced his fingertips across her eyelids, down the smooth slope of her nose, along the edge of her jaw, memorizing the contours of her face. His thumb finally settled against her lower lip, remembering the way she'd chewed on it while they'd talked earlier. She'd been so nervous that he wouldn't want to stay and coach her, as if there was even the slightest chance that he'd leave her.

Sasha watched as Payson's eyes fluttered open, knowing he should decamp from his current position but somehow not managing to make himself do it. He'd thought she was beautiful when she was sleeping, but she was even more so while waking up. He could watch this over and over again.

Far from being shocked or upset by his hand cradling her face, a slow smile spread across her lips and a low chuckle rumbled out of her throat. "You know, I've had dreams that started this way."

He hadn't previously been aware that his eyebrows could go _that_ high, but his incredulous expression didn't embarrass Payson the way it should have. A very faint blush spread across her cheeks, but other than that she was decidedly unabashed, and damn if the blush didn't just make her prettier.

He had a savage desire to _make_ her be embarrassed, so he asked the most inappropriate question he'd ever asked her: "You dream about me?"

"Are you really so oblivious that you're surprised by this?" she asked, chuckling again and flashing a smile that could only be described as sexy. He would never be able to forget her this way.

"I a-a-apparently am," he stuttered. He'd failed to embarrass her, but he'd wholeheartedly embarrassed himself. How oblivious was he?

Memories started flashing through his mind, one after another—and then doubt came. Had she _really_ always looked at him the way he was remembering now, or was he imagining it? And when she sat with him the night she broke up with her boyfriend and complained that he didn't understand her, she hadn't _actually_ compared Max to Sasha, had she? He didn't trust his memory to tell him the truth, because suddenly he realized that he _wanted_ her to have feelings for him. What he wanted more than anything else in the world was for her to keep looking at him exactly the way she was at that moment.

His thumb brushed against her lip of its own volition, eliciting a soft sigh from Payson. He took that as a cue and closed the small gap between them. It was the most perfect kiss of his life.

He wasn't sure how long they lost themselves in each other before he found himself staring into her eyes again, with that same sexy smile playing across Payson's lips. Had she always smiled that way? How had he never noticed before?

"I'd started to think that was never going to happen," she told him.

"How long? I was trying to figure it out, but I don't know what's real and what I'm imagining in retrospect." He wasn't sure why it was important to him to know how long she'd had feelings for him, but it was.

Her answer was simple. "Always. Since the day I met you. It just... got stronger as time went on. It started out as a crush, but by the time I kissed you I was full blown in love. Listening to you try to explain away those feelings and pretending like I agreed was one of the hardest things I've ever done."

"At the time I completely believed what I was saying. I was an arse."

Her giggle was another new experience for him. He'd heard her hearty laugh a million times before, but her earlier sultry chuckle and this giggle were completely new to him. He thought he knew Payson completely, but he'd learned so much about her in just a few hours. The most shocking of all was that she loved him, and had for nearly two years. A small voice at the back of his head told him that he felt the same way, although he wasn't even close to being ready to admit it.

They spent the next few hours talking, going over every misunderstood moment between them for the past couple of years. He'd been even more of an idiot than he'd realized, but he was done with missed opportunities. From now on he was going to kiss her every moment that he could—and plenty of moments availed themselves that night.

The whole world had brightened when Payson uttered the word 'love,' so he didn't even notice when the sun rose. Of course, it didn't help that his eyes were mostly closed and the rest of his senses were consumed with everything Payson. The world could have ended and he wouldn't have noticed.

What he _did_ notice was Lauren's voice saying, "Eww. Now we have to burn the couch."

Payson reluctantly broke their kiss and winked at him before pulling out of his arms and addressing her friend. "Okay, I'm a hundred percent certain that you had sex with James on our couch—which is really _my_ couch because I bought it—so you don't have a leg to stand on."

"First, you didn't have to see that, so it's totally different, and second, the person you're making out with is Sasha, so we're back to eww. No offense, Sasha."

"No, I think I'm going to be offended by that," he replied. He refused to give Lauren the satisfaction of laughing.

She sat down next to them, forcing them to shift over to accommodate her. She wasn't the least bit bothered by the revelation that her coach and best friend were apparently now in a relationship. She didn't even seem to be surprised. "So is this new or have you just been lying to us every time one of us asked you if there was anything going on?"

The question was directed at Payson, but Sasha was the one who responded. "How many times have you asked her that? And why?"

Lauren rolled her eyes. "Oh I don't know, maybe the millions of longing looks that you two exchange all the time, or the way you hang out at the gym together after practice, or that you're the top number on Payson's cell phone favorites. We've been convinced that you two were dating since like a month after she broke up with Max."

"This is getting too surreal for me. Payson, do you want to go somewhere else? Literally anywhere else."

She laughed and smiled up at him, and he was almost sad to see that it was her normal smile, not the sexy smile she wore last night. "I would love to, but I have an interview scheduled later this morning and I should actually try to get some sleep before then. Raincheck?"

It wasn't what he wanted to hear, but he knew she was right. He'd like to spend the next few days in a new-relationship-hideaway, but she'd just won the Olympics and there were going to be a lot of media demands on her. He'd have to share her with the rest of the world, so as much as he wanted to tell her to blow off her interview and stay with him, instead he said, "Deal. I'll see you later."

He stole one more kiss and left her to the heckling of her best friend, with his world looking completely different than it did the night before.

o-O-o

Sasha was hanging out with Austin, trying to kill the time until Payson texted him that she was free. He'd suffered without complaint when Marty teased him about coming back to their room in the morning, but refused to give him any details about where he'd been. He fell into bed and slept for a few hours, which was full of dreams of Payson, and then woke hoping to see her for real, and if he was being honest with himself, hoping to fulfill some of those dreams in reality. Instead he found out that her agent had stretched one interview into three, with a business lunch thrown in the middle, and she wouldn't be finished for hours.

Austin knew about them. Apparently Lauren told all of the girls as soon as they woke up, and Kelly told Austin pretty much immediately after. He'd been busting Sasha's balls about it for the past few hours, first openly and then with more subtlety once some of the other men joined them. Once he figured out that the jailbait jokes weren't going to affect Sasha, he'd moved to trying to get details out of him. With a jerk of his head toward the beach volleyball players on the TV, he asked, "Who's got a better rack, that woman or...?"

"You're an idiot of you think I'm answering that question. There is no winning in making comparisons. How are you even still in a relationship?"

Austin shrugged. "Kelly's not exactly _normal_. But then again, neither is... you know."

Trying to keep this a secret was a pain in the arse, but he didn't know how Payson might feel about being in a public relationship with him while there was so much attention on her. He was going to let her make that decision, and until she did, Austin would just have to keep referring to Payson as 'you know' while he asked inappropriate questions.

Thankfully beach volleyball was over when Payson got back, accompanied by Kelly and Lauren. Sasha wasn't entirely sure how to greet her, but he was fairly certain his initial desire to throw her over his shoulder caveman style and carry her back to his room wasn't appropriate. His indecision kept him glued to his seat on the couch.

Payson was not so indecisive. She walked straight to the couch and sat down beside him, leaning against his chest the way she'd sat all through the night before. She didn't seem the least bit concerned with the other members of the men's gymnastics team staring at them in shock.

"So is this just your place now?" he teased, amused by her forwardness.

"Yep. You got a problem with that?"

He had a feeling he was going to get very used to the huge grin that was currently gracing his face. "No, no problem. You can sit here for the rest of your life if you want." He may not be able to follow through with his caveman desires to lay claim to her, but he was more than willing to let her lay claim to him through her seat choice, and she could keep on doing it as long as she wanted.


End file.
